Book: Remembering Rose (Mapleby Memories Book 1) by Sheila Claydon

Sheila Claydon

about this book: Did you ever look at a photograph from another century and wonder who the people are and what they are thinking? I find old photos fascinating and I love watching those jerky black and white films of real people taken long ago.

It was an old photo that started me on the journey that led to my book 'Remembering Rose.' It was a sepia print of a largish group of young people and at the very front was a beautiful young woman with her hair piled high on the top of her head. Sitting close by was a very dashing young man wearing a straw boater hat and displaying a flourishing moustache. Standing between them was a small child with ringlets. I found the picture fascinating and never forgot it. Then, many years later, I was shown another picture of an elderly woman and her husband. They both looked thin and tired, and when I learned it was a photo of the same young couple when they were old my heart bled for them. They looked as if life had been unkind and it set me to wondering what had happened to them in the intervening years.

The result is 'Remembering Rose.' Although it's a fictional story, I have borrowed a few details from that long ago couple now there is nobody left to remember them. The village I set it in, Mapleby, is fictional too, and this is the first of a series called Mapleby Memories. I know which character I am going to take from the book and write about next. Maybe readers will be able to guess.